A Touch of Panic

Karl Alberg #6

by L.R. Wright

Businessman Gordon Murphy has something of a Midas touch...in everything but love. Now he's set his sights on Cassandra Mitchell, even though she's happily sharing a bed and breakfast with Sergeant Karl Alberg of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Meanwhile, Alberg has some actual policing problems to contend with - a stolen coin collection, a hapless would-be burglar, local worthies hollering about the state of one citizen's front yard. It all sounds charming, cozy, Cabot Cove....but this is Wright we're talking about, the novelist who beat Ruth Rendell at her own game and always saw the dark roots under the roses. Alberg may have left the Toronto police force in the belief that small-town crimes would be cuddlier, but Wright took great care in pointing out just how wrong he was.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Canada, Adult, Mystery Thriller, Crime, Thriller

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

L.R. Wright was born Laurali Rose Appleby on 5 June 1939 in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Known as Bunny, Wright grew up in Saskatoon and in Abbotsford, British Columbia. She worked as a reporter in Calgary before becoming a full-time writer in 1977. After publishing her fourth book, Wright returned to school, receiving an M.A. in Liberal Studies from Simon Fraser University. She taught writing at the University of British Columbia and wrote adaptations for several of her books for radio, film, and television. L.R. Wright died of breast cancer on 25 February 2001.

Series:
* Karl Alberg
* Eddie Henderson

Awards
Arthur Ellis Award: Novel
* 1991 – A Chill Rain in January – Winner
* 1996 – Mother Love – Winner

Reviews

[Natalie]

The Suspect - first in this series, I remember kept me turning the pages late into a jet lagged night - so too have all the other Alberg Mysteries, but none quite as compelling as the first - although each different enough from one another that you can feel the author trying things out, exploring the genre, pushing the envelope this way and that - then comes this one, which is just as readable as the first, yet still a completely different sort of book. It ranges wide and has a big cast of characters and subplots compared to some of the others - if this series ever comes to the screen this installment should be a two hour or cliff-hanger two episode special because of how it grabs you and just keeps moving through a variety of by now familiar local settings with special nods to a few favorite repeat characters.

[☺Trish]

I really liked this one. The ending earned an extra star. (That and Winifred stabbing that creep Keith with one of her father's swords.)
I hope book 7 has more about Winifred, Naomi & her kids, and Ronnie Plankton.

[BookAddict]

I liked this the least of all the books. The closet thief story just rambled on and on and on and on and on but his end story was funny at least. I just generally don't like stories about creepy stalkers. LR Wright had a wonderful way with words but this particular "episode" was just not for me.

[Allen Batchelar]

L.R. Wright had a knack for creating many characters woven into three or four story lines and bringing them all together. Her stories are very readable and enjoyable escapism.

[Helen]

I thought I'd read all of Wright's mysteries but I seem to have missed this one. It wanders around a bit, it's difficult to tell where the serious concerns are going to develop, and there's always the problems Karl faces with his ex, his daughters, and Cassandra. I'm prepared to forgive any awkwardnesses in the series because it's home she's writing about and even when she moves things around or puts businesses or streets that don't really exist onto her story map I don't mind because the feel is right. Sechelt has really changed since these stories were written, though, so I have to think back to before 2000. I think my favourite bit in this one was Mr. Dutton claiming the RCMP owed him 40 years rent for the land on which their station was built.
It isn't just the obvious fear that is referred to in the title. Everyone is ready to panic. Karl doesn't know where he is with his nearest and dearest, Stan is afraid his marriage is headed for the rocks, several residents at the Shady Acres are mildly terrorised, and what's with those boys growing up on the farm in the Fraser Valley?
It was a petty good read, but not quite as good as some of her others.

[Kevan Houser]

What a fun read! I randomly picked up this old paperback at the thrift shop. Never heard of the author. Turns out it's the sixth in a series featuring Karl Alberg, a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer. (Check out the cool, retro cover of the edition I read!)

(Spoiler-free review.)

Set in a small town in British Columbia (Sechelt) in the early 1990s (pre-social media, pre-internet, pre-cell phones), the tone reminds me a bit of the TV series "Desperate Housewives". The story is almost soap operatic, filled with over a dozen colorful, interesting characters, involved in several separate, but ultimately intertwined, subplots (there are maybe 20 or 30 characters with "speaking" roles when all is said and done). And it all works. The various stories are interesting and the major ones do converge in a way.

This is billed as a "crime" novel, but it wasn't what I expected. It's not really a mystery, per se. It's not really an investigation as the law enforcement characters, even the main man Karl Alberg, don't really conduct an investigation or do anything very police-like. Heck, Alberg isn't really the main character. It feels like he's just along for the ride.

If anything, it's more of a thriller than anything else, but I'd call it a "cozy thriller" (the term may exist, but I've never heard it before) in that there is a bit of tension, but nothing is really scary. It all feels terribly innocent and basically safe, tone-wise like an episode of "Desperate Housewives" or even "Murder, She Wrote."

Even the plausibility level of the story and its various plots is about that of the TV shows. In other words, not terribly authentic, believable, or plausible. But that's okay; it's part of its charm, actually.

The writer has a knack for juggling multiple characters and plot lines, and really cuts out all the boring stuff, just leaving short and medium scenes that really deliver and move the story forward. Some scenes are less than a page, others are several pages, but none feels too long or too short, and every single one contributes to the story. (This may not sound like a big deal, but it's actually a difficult thing for a writer to pull off.)

I liked the ending.

[Peggy]

I listened to this audiobook. I enjoy the multiple narrators for the various characters in this series. These books are always psychological in nature with vignettes of several stories overlapping each other. Karl Alberg is the Staff Sergeant in charge of the Sunshine Coast across the bay from Vancouver. His lover Cassandra Mitchell has moved in with him. She is afraid of boating and he has bought a sailboat. So, as they are independent individuals they decide he shall go on a week vacation sailing and she will have her own week vacation sometime in the future. So, off he goes. Cassandra is the town librarian and while at a work related conference she meets Gordon Murphy who is a nut case. Cassandra doesn't know that yet. Gordon has a completely wacky view of himself and the world. He has decided at first glance that Cassandra is the perfect woman for him. Never mind he's killed at least four other "perfect" women who let him down. While Karl is gone Cassandra is taken. Can she escape this madman? Meanwhile, there is a young man who is a petty burglar. He takes only a few items and isn't violent or mean spirited. There is a Mountie who is pursuing all the thefts. Can our thief keep getting away with it? The third story is about a cab driver named Winifred picks up a skinny young woman who gives her a sob story about trying to get her kids back from a drug using husband. Winifred, a widow, offers this waif Naomi a place to stay "for a couple of days" while she sorted her situation. This turns into a nightmare for Winifred as Naomi won't leave. Turns out Winifred is not as firm and stable as we thought. A good read.

[Milley]

I wrote in my last review for one of the books I this series that I felt the series had peaked already and was going down hill. It was the tired old “entitled man stalks and murders”that was really just torture porn same old same old. There was some stalking in Prized Possessions but it was wholesale here. The previous books had interesting and more unique reasons for the murder that matched the Sechelt location in both setting and characters. This dude and his victims could have been anywhere.

These middle of the series books are deft at winding some big threads together and this one is no different. The thief thread gives us more insight into the residents of Sechelt and is well done.

That said the writing was excellent as always and still recommend the entire series.

[Anne]

Off their heads, all of them

In Laureli Wright’s world on the BC Sunshine Coast, the residents are strange, to say the least. They include a beaten boy who grew up to be an expert mechanic and a secret thief, a shaven-headed recovering drug addict who steals back her two children, a taxi driver with imaginary kids and a vendetta against a neighbour she secretly fancies, and a psycho librarian seeking a soulmate with a body under his rose garden. All this to be decoded by the deceptively calm but irascible RCMP chief who has no idea how to accept his independent daughters’ choices, has yet to get properly accustomed to his new live-in girlfriend, and is dealing with a staff sergeant mystified as to why his menopausal wife might want to do a Greta Garbo on him.

[Chana]

I enjoyed the eccentric characters in this bit of a black humored and small town tragicomedy. Normal, some not so normal people in Sechelt, Canada become entangled in a series of cascading events.
The police chief and his librarian girlfriend; a psycho who thinks romance is consistent with kidnapping and drugging a woman; a lonely female taxi driver who takes in a young mother with a past who is trying to recover her children from her druggie husband; a nice thief who enjoys the adrenaline rush of stealing; and an assortment of other characters are the basis for this small town drama with a sense of humor.
I liked that all is well that ends well.

[Libby]

3.5 stars, because of the last few sentences. This one has a creepy lothario that Karl gets to slug. Then there is the cab driver that writes letters to fictitious twins, but never mails the letters. Something is up with Sid, Karl’s assistant. But the biggest surprise is the B and E character Jo we have great sympathy for because his terrible older brother beat him up all the time in childhood. He becomes a mechanic and a guy that breaks into laces and steals. Then, once, he breaks in and cleans up the place. Then, he breaks in and reads a letter and calls the police and Cassandra is rescued in time. Then, he applies to the Mounties! Ha!

[Flo]

As a police procedural the 6th book in L. R. Wright's Karl Alberg series is really bad, but as a novel it is really good. She has 3 or 4 plots running at the same time,some of which tie up together: A woman is kidnapped by a stalker, a thief goes about stealing, a drug trafficker and murderer is tracked, a woman tries to get her 2 children from her husband... Each of these has another side to it--not necessarily a good one but sometimes it does. The end seemed hurried and unexplained. A bit of a let down. Otherwise very well written. I think I'll save the next 2 for next month.

[JayeL]

As usual, the author has several storylines going that gradually come together. I thought this book ended abruptly. All of the threads were resolved and how they fit together was clear, but I was left hanging with some of the secondary story lines. What happened to Lester? Will Ronnie show up again up a later installment? Was the dead woman found in Gordon's yard? Did the police find evidence of Gordon's psychosis? Did Karl and Cassandra tell each other anything when they got back together? This book could have used an epilogue at the end.

[Bill Silva]

Like most of the books in the series, it’s not really a mystery or a thriller—and as far from a police procedural as you can get—but Wright’s style really hooks you (me), and I know I just wanted to keep on reading. How she comes up with these strange characters (even her two protagonists are conundrums) is beyond me…this group is particularly unusual. While it’s not violent or especially graphic, it is not at all “cozy”…it’s often downright creepy. It’s a series that really does need to be read in order to make sense, and not all the installments are winners—but this one is above average.

[Deane]

As usual, each story involves several 'cases'....one about a thief who not only steals items but does good deeds, too; Naomi fights for her children from their drug-dealer father but she has a rather lurid past; and Cassandra finds herself kidnapped by Gordon Murphy who is looking for the perfect woman to share his life with.
The event with Murphy has damaged Cassandra...she can't stand being alone; she is frightened.

[Bud Mallar]

expectations of a whodunit weren't met for the second time.

Wanna know about quirky characters in a rural small town, this is it.

lots of little side stories. two murders, but I don't recall anything happening about them - maybe in the next book - way too many characters to keep up with, a few over the top stories/situations, but a well tied together overall story.

Except for the parts which didn't 'finish'

[Julie]

This sure isn’t Cabot Cove

Three separate threads, loosely connected, knocking into each other and setting each other off. Still a fair amount of subtext to read. Also, second and barely mentioned characters in previous books are featured prominently in this book. The blurb doesn’t exactly tell the truth about Cassandra, Karl and the other guy.

[Cat]

Ok this chick writes crazy people so accurately it is scary. And writes all the different type of characters within a community as well. Scary and otherwise. Concerning, weird, the kind of people that are always there. Great story with quite a few loose ends
not tied up at the end. Love this series. People are scary though. Reminds me why I keep to myself.

[Samuel E.]

Great and fun, but …

I enjoyed this chapter of the Alberg & Cassandra story but, frankly, I was expecting more drama at the end. And I’m not clear on how she got away. He set the alarm and locked the door. How did it get unlocked and opened? Maybe I need to read the last few pages again.

[marilyn hickey]

My eighth in the series

I started with 1And before I knew it I d finished the eighth. JR indeed Addictive books. I go from 1 to the next because I want to know what's happening with the people in this small town. Great great great writing great characters great setting. I highly recommend this series

[.pl]

too sexual

I have liked all the series so far. But this one was way too sexual for me. I feel like the author has been steadily moving from a good, interesting police thriller with good characters into more sexually provocative themes which has been disappointing to me. I probably will discontinue reading this series. ☹️

[Jim]

Loved it. One of the best in the series.

I will start the next book in this series tonight and I've loves them all as much or more than many of the lame best seller's list mystery novels out now.

[Mary H]

Only just released that I was reading the sixth in a series I have never heard of before. It was enjoyable enough, and I listened to this book as I was flying over this very part of the country in a tiny little plane, so that was funny. Not really funny, but added some enjoyment to my flight.

[Sharon Thomas]

Very good

Several stories going on. Strong women characters. Alberg and Cassandra are moving forward with their relationship. Some new characters hope they stay in the storyline.

[Dr Ariel Rainey]

This one was chilling. Gordon Murphy was a PSYCHO. But the story was also balanced with the darkly comic thefts occurring all over town. I loved that ending with Robbie asking how to become a Mountie.

[Colleen]

Quite enjoyed the writing style & the characters!

[Mizloo]

Better than average cozy + madman story. Quick read, lots of threads, all touching on the issue of what belongs to whom.

[Ellen]

Best one yet in this series.

[Linda Stoner]

Delightful!

[Barbara]

Interconnecting plot lines.